John Bowen (alderman)
Alderman John Bowen JP was an English businessman and was High Sheriff of Worcestershire.
Bowen's father was a blacksmith from Rochford, Worcestershire.
in 2010
In 1875, he founded the firm of builders, John Bowen and Sons, in Birmingham, which was subsequently responsible for several notable buildings, not least Victoria Law Courts, and several others, on Corporation Street in that city.
He served as a magistrate in Worcestershire, was elected as an alderman for the county in 1892, and was High Sheriff of Worcestershire in 1916-17. Bowen is buried, with his second wife, at Brandwood End Cemetery.
In 2014 the Birmingham Civic Society unveiled a blue plaque in his honour, with the intention of affixing it to another of his buildings, a school now known as The Ark Academy in Tindal Street, in the city's Balsall Heath. The unveiling was attended by three High Sheriffs, for the West Midlands, Powys, and Worcestershire, as well as Deputy Lord Lieutenant David Bradnock. Bowen once lived on Tindal Street, and later lived in Moseley, in a house called Rochford, on Strensham Hill.
A biography, Alderman John Bowen J.P. 'Honest John by Bowen's great-grandson, Anthony Collins, was published in 2014.
